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  Group Members: Amanda Schwartz, Hollie Miller, Michael Fischer, Trevor Strobel
 * Sioux Falls School District Evaluation Plan - PART 1 **

To learn what the Sioux Falls School District is doing to incorporate technology into their classrooms. To provide stakeholders information on areas the district could improve their use of technology. To determine areas where staff may need training and development. To determine any software/hardware needs the district may have.
 * Evaluation Purpose --> Amanda**

The purpose of this evaluation is to provide the Sioux Falls School district, parents, and community with information regarding the district's access and use of technology in the school. The evaluation will review the district's current hardware and software and use that information to update the budget for the following school year to include the new technology needs found in the evaluation. The evaluation will also determine what areas the staff need additional training and professional development in order to be successful in integrating technology in the classroom.

The audience for this evaluation includes members of the Sioux Falls School Board, members of the administration, technology committee members, staff members, and members of the community. It is important that all stakeholders affected are addressed as the information will address how technology is being used currently and what the future looks like in terms of technology use in the schools. The stakeholders listed include those that make decisions on what technology will be present in the schools, those that actually implement the use of technology, as well as the members of the community that pay for the technology through taxes.
 * Evaluation Audience --> Michael**

The audience for this evaluation includes the stakeholders of the Sioux Falls School District—the technology planning committee members, the Sioux Falls School Board, members of the administration, and staff members. It is important that all stakeholders affected are addressed as the information will address what technology is being used currently, what future technology there may be in the schools, and how technology will be implemented in the schools. Others in the audience besides the stakeholders include the students, parents, and members of the community. These members of the audience include those that are directly affected in the classroom by the use of technology, the parental support of the students, and those who help pay for the technology through taxes. The entire audience comprises the educational community that needs to understand exactly how the school district stands in terms of technology.

· location of the school/district · type/age of students · technology infrastructure · professional development activities · technology goals
 * Description of the Evaluand, including --> Trevor**

The Sioux Falls School District 49-5 is located in the southeast region of South Dakota in the city of Sioux Falls. The district is the largest in the state with 41 schools, over 20,000 students in kindergarten through twelfth grade, over 1200 full-time classroom teachers. The overall student/teacher ratio is 16:1. Most students live in the urban areas of Sioux Falls but some open enrollment students live outside of the District boundaries. Each year the numbers of enrollment increase; the fall of 2008 population count showed the highest total enrollment ever for the Sioux Falls School District. The increase in total population is largely due to the number of minority students entering the district. Schools vary in the percentage of students who qualify for free and reduced lunches with an average of 38.6% for elementary, 33.9% for middle school, and 25.2% for high school.

Each school in the Sioux Falls School District have at least one computer lab with the high schools having two or three. Also, each of the schools has at least one wireless mobile lab with two or three in the high schools. The mobile labs usually consist of around 30 laptops that can travel between classrooms at teacher’s disposal. The District currently has 8 Building Computer Specialists (BCS) and each BCS supports anywhere from 732 to 970 desktops and laptops. In addition to desktops and laptops the BCSs support interactive white boards, video projectors, scanners, printers, and PDAs. The district also has 4 network support staff that support the district’s wireless access, 34 local-area-networks, and 59 file servers.

The professional development goal is to provide targeted and continuous technology related staff development for all employees. Activities include demonstrating technology proficiency, increase use of email system as a communication tool, increase use of mass communication, improve staff knowledge and use of the student management system, increase staff use of software and web applications, and increase staff understanding of ethics & implications in educational Wiki/Blogs/Social Networking sites. The district has really been emphasizing 21st Century Skills and has been integrating that philosophy into the curriculum for the past few years. The Sioux Falls School District wants to infuse technology with the mastery of 21st Century Skills. Three year goals for the district include easy access to teacher resources, increase students’ participation in online learning, and increase student interaction with 21st Century tools. Integrating technology with 21st Century skills and tools is a primary goal.


 * Guiding Evaluation Questions --> Hollie**

1. In the past academic year, what numbers of faculty and staff participated in technology professional development and what type of professional development was implemented? 2. How has the technology program influenced reading, math, and science achievement scores? 3. What number of faculty use [daily, weekly monthly] 21st century tools to teach reading, math, and science? 4. In what ways do students feel connected to a global learning environment? 5. How do students feel about their access to 21st Century tools at their school? 6. How do the faculty and staff feel about their access to 21st century tools at their school? 7. How has technology helped maintain effective communication with parents/guardians? 

The evaluation approach will be both formative and summative. The evaluation will be conducted by internal committee members and will consist of evaluating data from student achievement scores from the Dakota STEP Test. Interviews will be held with teachers, administrators, education assistants, students, and possibly parents/guardians. Surveys will completed internally by students at various grade levels, the teaching staff, and non-teaching staff to help measure how technology use is affecting the curriculum. Data collected will be used in an attempt to answer the evaluation questions. 
 * Description of Evaluation Approach (Formative/Summative, Internal/External, ...) --> Everyone help**